P. Tchaikoski

The Swan Lake

     In the spring of 1876 Piotr Illich Tchaikovski finished his first ballet. His tortures of cre­ation, doubts and uncertainty had been left behind. The composer was filled with joy and enthu­siasm as he felt in his heart and mind that his music was a success making a truly persuasive and charming composition. The troupe of Moscow Bolshoi Theatre, which had actually ordered The Swan Lake, got down to the work enthusi-astically as well. After ten months the playbill announced a premiere
     The 20th of February, 1877 entered the history of music culture. That day The Swan Lake was shown for the first time.
     Still, no matter how paradoxical it might seem, the performance turned out unsuccessful. Tchaikovski's music sounded dull, monotonous and danceless to the spectators at the premiere. In addition, the Austrian ballet-master Wenzel Reisinger honoured as the first choreographer of this ballet on stage, though-he belonged to the European celebrities, could only combine dances. Having realised that he wouldn't cope with P. 1. Tchaikovski's ballet music, symphonic by nature, Reisinger got to reshaping it in his own manner, cutting off the most complicated and the best pieces and replacing them with mediocre dance melodies of other composers. You could read in one of the very first notices after the Moscow pre-miere the following words about Wenzel Reisinger: "He is as apt at ballet stag­ing as a samovar at horse riding". P. Tchaikovski's music kept changing. "By tradition", the items on the programme were rearranged at each performance. Later on, in addi-tion to Tchaikovski's music, the ballet score incorporated some pieces by C. Pugni, L. Minkus and other composers. Though the first performance was a failure, it didn't become the final ver-dict, as frequently before. The ballet wasn't forgotten. But only after many years it would be taken up by such dis­tinguished choreographers as Lev Ivanov, Marius Petipas and Alexander Gorski. They would manage to read it in a really profound way and give it the second, and eternal, life of ballet mas­terpiece.
     The stage biography of The Swan Lake in Kyiv started in the 1920s, though some pieces of the classical ballet were shown by guest actors from Bolshoi and Mariyinski theatres in 1901-1915. Although Kyiv had had a marvel-lous opera team since long before, it only became possible to set up a professional ballet troupe as an independent crew in 1926. The second performance prepared by the troupe and shown on the 2nd of October, 1926 was The Swan Lake by P. Tchaikovski. Leonid Alexeyevich Zhukov, invit­ed to Kyiv as a ballet-master, lovingly and pro-fessionally transferred onto the Kyiv stage A. Gorski's version of the ballet staged by Moscow Bolshoi in 1922. It was decided that the main part should be shared between two dancers. Odette was danced by Maria Reisen who had made her name renowned during the famous Russian seasons in Paris and Monte Carlo, while Odile was per-formed by Vira Merkhasina, a young but amaz­ingly technical Kyiv ballet dancer. Siegfried was danced by Leonid Zhukov, who then played this role on the Bolshoi stage more than once.
     This version of the ballet, actually created by A. Gorski, lasted on the Kyiv stage for quite a long time, with only slight revisions and innova­tions. The ballet parts were per­formed by a number of bril­liant dancers, including Olexandra Havrylova, Klavdia Vasina, Zinayida Louriet.

     In 1937 a new version of The Swan Lake was staged by Halyna Olcxiyivna Berezova, the then Chief Ballet Master of Kyiv Academic Opera-and-Ballet Theatre. Keeping the classical dance items of L. Ivanov, M. Petipas and A.Gorski, and restoring the musical pieces removed by some conductors and artistic directors, she took as a basis her teacher Professor A. Vaga-nova's search and experience, and thus created an exciting romantic drama with a clear plot development, deeply revealing the inner world of its characters, especially Odette-Odile. This version of The Swan Lake is also notable for the debut on the Kyiv stage of the celebrat­ed Ukrainian ballerina Antonina Ivanivna Vasylieva, another A. Vaganova's pupil who then became the first Ukrainian ballet dancer awarded the title of People's Artist of Ukraine.

     In 1945 the Theatre got back to the unfading masterpiece of P. Tchaikovski for the third time. A new version was staged by the famous ballet-master People's Artist of Russia Fedir Vasylyo-vych Lopukhov. He enriched the fantastic component of the ballet, turning the cordial love story of Siegfried and Odette into a fairy tale. The performance was dan-ceful in the broadest meaning of this word. It gave birth to the tra­dition of deepening the choreo­graphic text of Siegfried and Rothbard's parts, which had been long interpreted as pantomimic. And again, a bunch of actors got a chance to fully express the whole range of their creative palette.
     Later on, the Theatre turned back to this unsurpassed master­piece of the Russian classical bal­let art three more times. In 1970
     Kyivites became familiar with the version of ballet-master Robert Kliavin. In 1980 they saw cho­reographer Anatoli Shekera's interpretation of the ballet. In 1986, during their guest tour in Spain, the Kyiv troupe showed a premiere of The Swan Lake staged byValeri Kovtun.
     The Swan Lake by P. Tchaikovski revealed the dancing skills of Olena Potapova, Valcntyna Kalynovska, Tetiana Tayakina, Liudmyla Smorhachova, Rayissa Hyiko, Tetiana Borovyk, Hanna Kushnirova, Olena Filipyeva, Iryna Dvorovenko, Valeri Kovtun, Robert Kliavin, Serhiy Lukin, Mykola Priadchenko, ViktorYaremcnko, Viktor Rybiy and others. The Swan Lake performance staged by Anatoli Shekera acquaints us with an interesting interpretation of the classical ballet. The choreographer tried to preserve the best achievements of M. Petipas, L. Ivanov and A. Gorski, but also creatively rethink Tchaikovski's composition.

Vasyl TURKEVYCH